Forum - View topicNEWS: Christopher Handley Sentenced to 6 Months for 'Obscene' Manga
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Zin5ki
 Posts: 6680 Location: London, UK |
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How very strange. Still, this provides a loophole for those who venture abroad to obtain the latest doujin: so long as one uploads scans without shipping any printed material or charging a fee, one's innocence in face of the Protect Act is ensured by the Constitution. Could a prosecution nonetheless attempt to override this right, and argue a case against downloaders of scanned material by categorising their act of obtaining digital content as a form of interstate commerce? |
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Daemonblue
 Posts: 701 |
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I believe they're already trying to do that with that Max Hardcore guy or w/e, but then they would have to have some proof that you actually downloaded it from the internet and not copied it from someone's pc or cd/dvd/usb stick, which, unless the FBI gets what they want and forces ISPs to keep records of traffic for 2 years, would be hard to prove.
If you want to go even further down the rabbit hole, there are ways to completely forego an ISP to gain internet access (which I will not explain here) that would make you completely anonymous to even DPI (which is, for the most part, illegal anyway), as no one would be able to track you down via your connection, so even the 2 years of data retention will mean moot to anyone dedicated enough. With all that said, those of you who probably aren't tech savvy should do some more reading on a lot of this stuff, seeing as there are virii that will use your computer as a hub and download CP to your comp for someone else to get from you, while you take the fall. Know thy enemy, as some people would put it. |
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ClocktowerKyon
 Posts: 36 |
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Wow. 6 months in jail, 3 years of supervised release, and 5 years of probation? THEY'RE F-ING DRAWINGS! I can draw a picture of an 11-year old being raped by a tiger and his pet elephant; should I go to jail for that? There is a very fine line between child porn and loli: one actually requires a living, breathing child to pose for some sick person and can leave to emotional scarring on the child's part; the other require ink and paper and affects NO ONE except perhaps the reader who may or may not feel guilty for reading it.
If we are to assume that people who read and make loli are pedophiles, let us also assume that: Edgar Allen Poe is a murderer, Ryukishi is a Satanist, Blake Edwards is a theif, Douglas Adams is legally insane, and that Anthony Burgess is a gang member. See how all of those make no sense? |
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Baltimoron
 Posts: 43 Location: Charm City |
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I'm in agreement with you vis a vis the "only six months"/"six months is too long" contradiction. But in the end I'm just glad that his sentencing judge took the rare action of handing out a term below even the minimum suggested by the federal guidelines. In another thread I did some calculations based on the sentencing info available from the DOJ's website and even what appeared to be the best case scenario was considerably bleaker than what Handley actually got. That's only in terms of actual time inside, of course. Upon release he'll be an unemployable pariah ruined over material in which the depicted victim was a collection of inked pencil lines. His time in prison shouldn't be too bad, actually. A sentence as short as his will be served in a minimum security federal prison camp. His fellow inmates will be serving similarly short sentences for non-violent offenses or will be finishing out the final portions of longer sentences and won't be looking to make trouble for themselves as they get ready to go back out into the world. American prisons are far and away the worst in the first world, but federal prison camps manage not to be too bad when it comes to living conditions that constitute gross violations of human rights. Despite his relatively lenient sentence, this is a gross miscarriage of justice that will--sadly--go almost totally unnoticed by mainstream America due to the unsympathetic nature of the victim. Even worse is that it couldn't have been anything but. Those saying that Handley shouldn't have taken a plea agreement need to understand that federal courts offer their prosecutors better odds than Vegas casinos offer their dealers. Federal conviction rates hover somewhere around 85% and federal judges actively collude with prosecutors to punish defendants for not taking deals. Had he not pleaded guilty he would almost certainly have been found guilty and subsequently spent significantly more time behind bars. Furthermore, cases in which convictions are attained via guilty pleas do not establish precedent. Given the Constitutionally tenuous nature of this law, not arguing Handley's case all the way to one of the most authoritarian groups of Supreme Court Justices in recent memory was likely a boon to Americans concerned with free speech. |
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otto117
Posts: 17 |
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Sorry - I really didn't mean to be rude. He couldn't be charged for the images on his computer for one or a few reasons (only the prosecutor knows for sure): (a) those images didn't depict lolicon the gov't felt like prosecuting (perhaps it depicted 'older' looking representations), (b) there was no evidence that Handley downloaded those images or within the past 5 years (the statute of limitations), or (c) the gov't had enough and they wanted to simplify the case and avoid forensic experts, and in any case they knew they could use it on sentencing against Handley for 'uncharged' criminal conduct. (You can find this topic covered in the United States Sentencing Guidelines.) Whorley wasn't convicted of possession. He was convicted of downloading and viewing lolicon online. The government had the computer information because Whorley chose to do his downloading (and printing out some of the images) at the Virginia employment commission where he was supposed to be looking for a job. (I guess he was looking for the wrong kind of job. Ahem.) So it was a state computer and it was secured before any of the downloading and viewing evidence could be destroyed. That said, according to his public defender, the case was vastly overcharged in that there was clearly material that the jury decided that Whorley saw, but for which there was no actual proof that he did. (Cached jpgs.) It isn't difficult to find evidence of downloading unless the computer user takes steps to wipe the appropriate files and free space on the computer, etc. It would be nice to say that the right to possess is covered by the First Amendment, but if it were, the courts would then have to recognize a correlative right to receive the material. Otherwise it would be a right that couldn't often be legally exercised. With the right based in the Fourth Amendment, the court is under no obligation to say that you have a right to receive the material. Hence the Supreme Court's analogy of 'obscenity' to other forms of contraband. (Yeah, at best this borders on the intellectually dishonest.) Sorry again for seeming so curt. |
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otto117
Posts: 17 |
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That's what the law already says. It doesn't matter if you ship it or upload it or download it. I don't think you'll find a loophole in the actual law: (1) any communication involved in or made in furtherance of the offense is communicated or transported by the mail, or in interstate or foreign commerce by any means, including by computer, or any means or instrumentality of interstate or foreign commerce is otherwise used in committing or in furtherance of the commission of the offense; (2) any communication involved in or made in furtherance of the offense contemplates the transmission or transportation of a visual depiction by the mail, or in interstate or foreign commerce by any means, including by computer; (3) any person travels or is transported in interstate or foreign commerce in the course of the commission or in furtherance of the commission of the offense; (4) any visual depiction involved in the offense has been mailed, or has been shipped or transported in interstate or foreign commerce by any means, including by computer, or was produced using materials that have been mailed, or that have been shipped or transported in interstate or foreign commerce by any means, including by computer; or (5) the offense is committed in the special maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the United States or in any territory or possession of the United States. (e) Affirmative Defense. - It shall be an affirmative defense to a charge of violating subsection (b) that the defendant - (1) possessed less than 3 such visual depictions; and (2) promptly and in good faith, and without retaining or allowing any person, other than a law enforcement agency, to access any such visual depiction - (A) took reasonable steps to destroy each such visual depiction; or (B) reported the matter to a law enforcement agency and afforded that agency access to each such visual depiction. (f) Definitions. - For purposes of this section - (1) the term "visual depiction" includes undeveloped film and videotape, and data stored on a computer disk or by electronic means which is capable of conversion into a visual image, and also includes any photograph, film, video, picture, digital image or picture, computer image or picture, or computer generated image or picture, whether made or produced by electronic, mechanical, or other means; (2) the term "sexually explicit conduct" has the meaning given the term in section 2256(2)(A) or 2256(2)(B); and (3) the term "graphic", when used with respect to a depiction of sexually explicit conduct, means that a viewer can observe any part of the genitals or pubic area of any depicted person or animal during any part of the time that the sexually explicit conduct is being depicted. |
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otto117
Posts: 17 |
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You might even point out that early on in Clockwork Orange, some of Alec's droogs rape a 10yo girl. Pg. 15: "...Billyboy and his droogs stopped what they were doing, which was just getting ready to perform something on a weepy young devotchka that they had there, not more than ten, she creeching away but with her platties still on, Billyboy holding her by one rooker and his number one, Leo, holding the other. The'd probably just been doing the dirty slovo part of the act before getting down to a malenky bit of ultra-violence. When they viddied us a-coming they let go of this boo-hooing little ptitsa, there being plenty more where she came from, and she ran with her thin white legs flashing through the dark, still going 'Oh, oh, oh.'" |
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Cait
 Posts: 503 |
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No, it's okay. I was annoyed at a lot of things the other day and I ended up getting snippy when I initially read your response. It's as much my fault for getting offended by text on a screen. But yeah, these laws are officially pissing me off now (not that I liked them before or anything)... |
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oldybutgoody
Posts: 2 |
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The last surviving? elements of Protect Act 2003 reminds one of scurrying rats in the face of Ashcroft vs Free Speech & the later Virtual Child Porn being not criminalized & "as available as ever" decree of the Supreme Court in the United States v. Williams, 553 U.S. (2008). As Governor George Wallace standing with a shotgun in front of Alabama University to keep black students away disregarding the Supreme Court after the Supreme Court ruled that southern schools must integrate. lol
Obscenity laws are normally punished as major misdemeanors or minor felonies of 3 months to under several years of imprisonment anyways, targeting the seller or producer 99% of the time - virtually never the purchaser (true photographic child abuse porn the exception, following the Feber ruling). How come the millions of American men of my Dad's generation are not in prison for subscribing to Hustler magazine with its many years running monthly Chester the Molester cartoons? How come the tens of millions of Americans are not in prison who download and share Bart Simpson cartoon porn featuring Maggie & friends over the past decade or two? How come the million of Americans and most every adult DVD retailer in America and the Web is not in prison who sell for years DVD's featuring over 18's cosplaying preschoolers, gradeschoolers and Middleschoolers having XXX intergenerational sex in the number one selling XXX DVD's in America - Not the Bradys XXX, Not the Bradys XXX Marcia, Marcia Marcia XXX, Not the Bradys XXX Pussy Power, Not the Cosby Show XXX, This Ain't the Partridge Family XXX, Not Married with Children XXX etc. Handley should have never taken a plea bargain with the inability to appeal because the Feds KNEW it would ultimately be overturned and declared unconstitutional. Handley would have been better off setting up a retail shop in Iowa and becoming the Iowa importer/distributor of your typical Japanese AV Idol Adult DVDs with 4'-9" tall petite A cup 18 to 22 year old pornstars cosplaying Sailor Suit uniform Hi-schoolers & Middleschoolers getting raped in school, which is US legal and never been prosecuted for a decade or two. lol |
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otto117
Posts: 17 |
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Beg to differ. 1466A has been upheld in the 4th, 9th and 11th Circuits. The only chance that Handley had to overturn 1466A was to argue under Lawrence v. Texas that the section infringes on the rights of people attracted to minors on equal protection grounds. (This argument was not made in the aforementioned cases, as far as I know.) There is no indication anywhere that the Supreme Court wants to overturn the obscenity laws in general. Handley was looking at 8 years in jail under the sentencing guidelines. He was looking at an impossible defense on the grounds of serious artistic value. His conviction was almost assured. That's why he took a plea. |
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Mohawk52
 Posts: 8202 Location: England, UK |
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oldybutgoody
Posts: 2 |
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The guy was obviously railroaded because of where he lived; if he resided in San Francisco with all the 1st, 2nd & 3rd generation Asian-Americans residing there who ALSO order similar materials NOTHING would have happened to him.
These other "violators" are not in trouble either: All the "First Time Sex" sex stories & personal history websites on the internet. lol All the USA porn DVD titles featuring the Vivid porn company girls to countless 18-21 years old "gonzo" porn actresses dressed as high school cheerleaders in high school locker rooms or in pigtails sucking their thumbs as "babysitters"? All the past issues sold by the hundreds of thousands every month for 2 decades nationwide of Hustler Barely Legal magazine or Tight magazine or Lolipops magazine, which you can still view covers of, and order back issues online from various usedmagazines dot com type retail establishments. "...Supposedly, UK customs briefly refused to allow magazine distributors to import Tight from the US because they could not believe that the models were of age. They only relented when the importers presented the customs inspectors with copies of the models' photo IDs and birth certificates." lol My understanding was that the Comic Book Defense advisorial capacity lawyers were in fact going to bring in scholars to say that the manga in question was in fact artistic and the product of skilled highly gifted talents. |
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tyciol
 Posts: 134 Location: Canada |
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You know, I have this ongoing urge to call Handley a hero, and in a way he is even without knowing anything about him for lasting as long as he did. Even if he eventually chose not to fight, he could have caved earlier I think, and stuck it out a little bit to hear the options.
Certainly, what he did is something I`m sure he`s not the first to do, so I won`t single him out as a hero for that but... just looking at his life... this guy is really a role model for how a lot of us could lead our lives... Just look at all the NEETS and Hikikomori and so forth. Just think of the Welcome to the NHK and Pururin. Sure, he`s an otaku, perhaps reclusive and what people might call weird, a nerd, a hentai, a deviant... But I think Christopher is a pretty cool guy eh pays for his LO and doesnt afraid of anything. How many of us have had the courage to face the horrors of war, I wonder. He has accomplished great education. A great person like this could be bettering society, inspiring others. Let`s assure that he does do this for us, for it is possible to relate to his reclusive hobbies and know that he has accomplished great things in spite of them. I think the government should be brought to task, they should set him free, compensate him for his time and suffering, and offer him employment in the military under a new identity so that he can prosper as he deserves to for all the hard work he has put in. I only wish the average person did so much for the greater good. |
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Altare
Posts: 37 |
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He should have had drawings of guro or something. Everyone know sex is more evil than violence.
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Sailor Star Dust
 Posts: 166 Location: US and A |
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Massive thread-necro (please Merge or Move to the appropriate thread if necessary! Thank you!), but I'm curious since cases like this are still happening http://www.comicsalliance.com/2011/06/27/u-s-citizen-arrested-in-canada-for-manga-on-laptop-faces-minim/ .
Was there ever a follow-up to Christopher Handley's case? (5 years probation is still in effect, apparently.) And what manga/doujinshi possession means, if anything, for anime & manga fans? As I understood it, part of what got him in trouble was some 100-year state obscenity law that was still in effect in Iowa. From the sound of things, Handley must have been pressured into pleading guilty and/or couldn't afford a damn good lawyer. As for my two cents on the debate: I find loli to be squicky as hell, but still, it's fiction. Ink on paper. Not real people being harmed. Thought Police is beyond dumb, especially when REAL criminals like murderers and rapists get away with less then a supposed obscenity charge like this! |
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